


Survivors

by Skyepilot



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Daisy is everything, Death, F/M, Feels, Gen, Guilt, Meldrew Mentions, Simmons is awesome, Survivor Guilt, meta feels, not Fitz friendly, obviously I hate Ward, reflections
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-11
Updated: 2015-12-11
Packaged: 2018-05-06 02:30:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5399477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skyepilot/pseuds/Skyepilot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Based on the mid-season finale for S3. This is written very much from a Skoulson shipper POV, so don't even bother reading it if you don't like the idea of that, or commenting on it.  It's all the original team reflecting on how things would be different if they had killed Ward when they had the chance to earlier.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Survivors

The team doesn’t question him at all.

He even gets a few solemn comments like, “It had to be done.”

Hunter acts a bit wounded, like he’s been robbed, but he sees it when Bobbi looks at him.

She’s grateful that it wasn’t Hunter who did it.

And so, he’s faced with a problem. 

The realization that he didn’t want to be the one to do it. 

He doesn’t want their gratitude, or their pity.

But he did it.

What’s wrong with him?

He wanted to protect them.

But he didn’t.

Why did he let Grant Ward keep coming back, and chipping away at them?

He starts to see it all laid out before him now, making all the connections that he missed before.

Seeing the Big Picture, in hindsight.

He sat in that basement and asked him, over and over, to give up intel on HYDRA.

Ward just waited.  Until he got what he wanted.

And then he imagines, what if he had ended it then?  Could he have?

Would Daisy have gone to the Temple?

Why couldn’t he end it.

 

#

She looks over at Fitz in the lab and they’re talking, but he’s holding something back.

It’s about Will, of course.

Neither one of them is ready to talk about it, but they’re keeping busy, like they do.

Will feels like he’s already slipping away from her, and she’s not sure.

Part of her thinks that she should let it go, and part of her just wants him to still be alive. 

To hold on to that brief bit of-

She swallows it down.

If she had killed Ward, when she tried, if she had succeeded, maybe HYDRA would’ve found a way there.

It would’ve been without Ward using them, though.

And what he knew about her and Fitz.

Treating her like a weakness when she would’ve gladly wasted her last breath telling him what a pathetic man he was.

She can feel Fitz's eyes on her, but she doesn't look up.  
  
They stopped HYDRA from bringing that horror back.  
  
It's a win, isn't it?  Supposed to be.  
  
It doesn't feel like much of one.  
  
#  
  
She should've ended him instead of just breaking his larynx.  
  
Not Phil, _her_.  
  
She didn't want to believe that she was the kind of monster he was, then.  
  
SHIELD isn’t HYDRA.  She wasn’t a traitor.

There are rules about that sort of thing.

And damn those rules.

HYDRA had Andrew, _because_ of Ward.

He used that against her and dragged him into this.

Just when she wanted to walk away.

Like a parting gift, taking away the last thing that she had protected.

Even from SHIELD.

From herself.

Of course she doesn’t deserve this.  Of course Andrew is the consequence.

She stares at the picture in her hand. 

The one that he’d kept in his office at the University all these years.

She always imagined him going on.

Even if she didn’t.

And he was still waiting for her to come back safe.

 

#

Jemma won’t even look at him.

Because he’s accomplished nothing.

And, _and_ , he got her off that planet, only to make her suffer more.

He doesn’t want to tell her about Will at all.

Why would he?

Will died like a hero, fighting that _thing_.

“ _He was willing to die, and I’m still here.”_

_“And I’m not Will.”_

Maybe Will would’ve let Ward suffocate after he’d sent Jemma to die at the bottom of the ocean?

Instead of trying to “fix” everything.

Will wouldn't have killed Ward from a distance.  
  
Probably.

Which is why Will's dead.  
  
_He_ could've though.

And Ward deserved it.  
  
He just wanted to help, and Ward deserved to die.

 

#

She wonders about that moment.

Since he’s dead.

Since he took a part of someone she loves with him.

Four times.

Who comes back from that?

She went right for the chest, like she had practiced.

But she didn’t know, and she wanted to stop HYDRA, and now it’s too late.

Now, she’s _this_.

And even in death, he’s still haunting them all, but…

Him the most.

And she can see what he’s doing, trying to compartmentalize it all, and she wonders if she’s lost him.

They’ve always found each other, but now they both have to be SHIELD.

She wants to feel guilty, but, she can’t.

Because if she hadn’t left Ward to die, her father would’ve killed him.

He’s still here.

And whatever Ward intended, she’s not going to let him win.

 

 

 


End file.
